Promotion of Duracell batteries in Kazakhstan

The explosion in the use of portable devices and electronic products such as laptops, toys, audio devices, etc. has resulted in a rapidly increasing demand for portable energy sources. However, the market of primary (non-rechargeable) batteries has shrunk over the past decade. This project is about a proposed campaign for encouraging people to use more of the declining product, reminding them of the forgotten need, on the example of the current market leader Duracell brand by Procter & Gamble.

Primary batteries are most commonly used in portable devices, usually when you do not have the chance to re-charge. Examples can be CD, MP3-players, portable TV-sets, toys taken with children to picnics, lamps, and cameras. Our idea is to take out people to places where they need to keep their devices going but do not have an option to re-charge, that means encouraging them to travel to the nature: mountain trips, bike trips far from home, picnics with family, beach trips etc. It has gone out of the habit since people became too busy with their job, not having time to devote to their spirit, health and fun shared together with close people. The campaign will be directed to re-create this trend for country trips. This will be achieved by telling people how attractive are places around Almaty and they shouldn’t miss the opportunity to enjoy the sights on weekends.

Competitive Analysis
There are 3 major consumer battery brands presented on Kazakhstani market: current market leader Duracell, its closest follower Energizer, and niche player Varta, as well as many other less popular brands.

Duracell is widely recognized, top of mind awareness brand. Most of our respondents named Duracell when it was asked to name any consumer battery brand that comes into their mind first. There is also recall connected to Duracell’s advertising, people easily recognize the symbol of Duracell – the famous pink bunny.

It is also a market leader because it is available at points of sales, which is very important for low-involvement goods. Duracell batteries can be found in all sizes in most supermarkets, unlike its main competitor Energizer.
Slogan of Duracell is “Trusted everywhere” suggesting that Duracell batteries make all devices work when needed and the range of Duracell application.
The previous slogan was “No battery is stronger longer” pointing at longer life of the batteries. Generally all the bunny-related ads where directed to express the main message of longevity of work, this is the key benefit of Duracell.
Energizer’s current slogan “Keep going” and former slogan “Nothing outlasts the Energizer” also emphasizes long working hours of the batteries. However, in its advertising campaigns Energizer has stressed high energy of the batteries making it the key benefit of the brand.

“You’re smarter to fit Varta!” says the slogan of our last competitor. Varta uses ESP suggesting that it’s a battery by experts, something more “professional”.

All the three brands share a common POP which is high quality and reliability.
Duracell has to follow defensive strategy and increase its share of voice to maintain its leading position on the market.

Target Market Analysis
Generally, target market for alkaline batteries is both deep and wide. But it is even more. Almost every person is a potential customer for this type of batteries. In this case even segmentation is quite complicated. But it is necessary for creating marketing strategy, so we have to point out several biggest consumer groups. The first is households. Women between 25-50 age old, they keep their houses in order and use batteries for devices we use everyday such as clocks. The second and third groups we want to mention are teenagers and men. These customers differ in the age group, but are same in the purpose of consumption. They use alkaline batteries for high-tech devices. But now this market, that once has been extremely big and profitable, now rapidly decreases. It is concerned with technical progress. Now producers of high-tech devices use other types of batteries, usually rechargeable and often produced by these companies itself.

Duracell uses differentiated market coverage.
Different products of Duracell brand are targeted to different segments.
regular and high-drain segments of the consumer battery market
Duracell Copperhead covers broader market, including the general population who need longer-working batteries for majority of devices.
Duracell Ultra is designed to fit more energy requiring devices, and therefore the target group is typically younger males.

Communication objectives
First of all we should define Target Audience. Duracell has different types of battery. The most needed types are AA and AAA series. Significant part of battery users is young generation that listen music by CD of MP3 players. This age starts from 14 years old till 25 even 30 years. Gender difference is doesn’t matter because everybody like music according his or her preference. Duracell is the top mind awareness brand on the World and Kazakhstan battery market. The competitors are: Energizer, Varta and Victory (Chinese battery). This industry is in the decline stage because of increasing use of rechargeable and integral batteries in devices like photo mobile phones, cameras, and players. Also, consumers are getting used to rechargeable batteries while they use laptops and phones, and bring this habit to their MP3 players and cameras.
The main goal of Duracell is to raise knowledge, since awareness is already at hand.

Battery is daily used, low involvement product. So this product requires product recognition at purchasing place. More products will be recognized better off the company. Because it is a low-involvement good stress should be put on the emotional rather than rational benefit from using the brand.
Duracell should use following communication tools:

– Point-of-purchase promotion
– TV advertising
– Printed media in thematically related magazines (e.g. about technology)
– PR and sponsorship
– Internet Advertising

On Kazakhstani market today Duracell is a stable leader with competitors falling behind dramatically. As it was mentioned before there is already well-established brand awareness, therefore all communication objectives should be supportive, only to maintain the image of the brand and keep it’s recall and recognition level high.

3.0 MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS PLAN

3.1 On a market where Duracell brand is well established it is important to retain its market position. At the same time, Duracell can encourage people to use more batteries by promoting our new campaign, through communication tools. The objective is to increase profit by 15% during in FY 2008.

Marketing communications objectives
So far Duracell has covered all the levels of the DAGMAR model: category need, awareness, knowledge, attitude, purchase intention, facilitation, purchase, satisfaction and loyalty. It has been a trusted leader for a long time. However, as we detected the market still can be penetrated by returning to the first level and developing category need more.
The mission of the campaign is to get consumers to use more primary batteries by encouraging them to take part in activities such as traveling, hiking and camping. Our goal is to remind people of the forgotten use of the batteries – whenever you go outside (to the mountains, the beach, forest) you need non-rechargeable batteries vitally to keep all your devices going.
3.3 Positioning
Duracell’s positioning is as clear and simple as the product category requires: long life of the batteries.
3.4 Creative and Message Strategy
Key message: Duracell serves longer than any other battery and therefore can be trusted whatever direction you go.
Slogan: Trusted everywhere
Key visual:
Emotional appeal should be used in Duracell ads, primarily to attract attention and be liked.
3.5 Marketing Communications Mix
PR should be used primarily for the new strategy.
3.6 Media Strategy:
Pulsing strategy
3.7 Media schedule (with calculations of effectiveness) (10points) Schedule should include all your tools of communication on all channels of com-on with distribution over the year, month, week and day period.
3.8 Budget (approach, actual calculations)